The Losers

by David Eddings

  Flood’s language seemed to shift back and forth between an easy colloquialism Raphael found comfortable and a kind of stilted eastern usage. There was a forced quality about Flood that made him uncomfortable.

  They had a couple of drinks, and Raphael feigned enjoyment, although the sharp taste of nearly raw gin was not particularly to his liking. He was not really accustomed to drinking, and Flood’s martinis were strong enough to make his ears hot and the tips of his fingers tingle. “Well,” he said finally, setting down his glass, “I guess I’d better go get moved in.”

  “Taylor,” Flood said, an odd note in his voice. “I’ve got a sort of an idea. Is your roommate up the hall an old friend?”

  “Never met the man, actually.”

  “And I’ve never met Edwards either—obviously. Why don’t you room in here?” There was a kind of intensity about the way Flood said it, as if it were far, far more important than the casual nature of the suggestion called for.

  “They don’t allow that, do they?” Raphael asked. “Switching rooms, I mean?”

  “It’s easy to see you’ve never been in a boarding school before.” Flood laughed. “Switching rooms is standard practice. It goes on everywhere. Believe me, I know. I’ve been kicked out of some of the best schools in the east.”

  “What if Edwards shows up and wants his bed?”

  “We’ll give him yours. I’ll lie to him—tell him I’ve got something incurable and that you’re here to give me a shot in case I throw a fit.”

  “Come on.” Raphael laughed.

  “You can be the one with the fits if you’d rather,” Flood offered. “Can you do a convincing grand mal seizure?” “I don’t know. I’ve never tried.”

  “The whole point is that we get along fairly well together, and I don’t know diddly about Edwards. I know that you’re white, but I haven’t got any idea at all about what color he is.”

  “Is that important?” Raphael said it carefully.

  Flood’s face suddenly broke into a broad grin. “Gotcha!” he said gleefully. “God, I love to do that to people. Actually, it doesn’t mean jack-shit to me one way or another, but it sure as hell does to old J.D. Sooner or later somebody from back home is going to come by, and if words gets back to the old pirate that his son has a nigger roommate—his word, not mine—thee shit will hit thee fan. Old J.D.’s prejudiced against races that have been extinct for thousands of years—like the Hittites—or the Wends.”

  “It won’t work out then, Damon,” Raphael told him with a perfectly straight face. “My mother’s Canadian.”

  “That’s all right, Raphael. I’m liberal. We’ll let you come in through the back door. Have Canadians got rhythm? Do you have overpowering cravings for northern-fried moose?”

  Raphael laughed. The young man from the east was outrageous. There was still something slightly out of tune though. Raphael was quite sure that he reminded Flood of someone else. Flood had seemed about to mention it a couple of times, but had apparently decided against it. “All right,” he decided. “If you think we can get away with it, we’ll try it.”

  “Good enough. We’ll drop the Rafe and Jake bit so we don’t sound like a hillbilly band, and we’ll use Damon and Raphael—unless you’d like to change your name to Pythias?”

  “No, I don’t think so. It sounds a little urinary.”

  Flood laughed. “It does at that, doesn’t it? Have you got any more bags? Or do you travel light?”

  “I’ve got a whole backseat full.”

  “Let’s go get them then. Get you settled in.”

  They clattered downstairs, brought up the rest of Raphael’s luggage, and then went to the commons for dinner.

  Damon Flood talked almost continuously through the meal, his rich voice compelling, almost hypnotic. He saw nearly everything, and his sardonic wit made it all wryly humorous.

  “And this,” he said, almost with a sneer as they walked back in the luminous twilight toward their dormitory, “is the ‘most intelligent group of undergraduates in the country’?” He quoted from a recent magazine article about the college. “It looks more like a hippie convention—or a soirée in a hobo jungle.”

  “Appearances can be deceiving.”

  “Indeed they can, Raphael, Angel of Light”—Flood laughed—“but appearance is the shadow at least of reality, don’t you think?”

  Raphael shrugged. “We’re more casual out here on the coast.”

  “Granted, but wouldn’t you say that the fact that a young lady doesn’t wear shoes to dinner says a great deal about her character?”

  “Where’s your home?” Raphael asked as they started up the stairs.

  “Grosse Pointe,” Flood said dryly, “the flower on the weed of Detroit.”

  “What are you doing way out here?” Raphael opened the door to their room.

  “Seeking my fortune,” Flood said, flinging himself down on his bed. Then he laughed. “Actually, I’m putting as much distance as possible between my father and me. The old bastard can’t stand the sight of me. The rest of the family wanted me to go to Princeton, but I preferred to avoid the continuous surveillance of all those cousins. A very large family, the Floods, and I have the distinction of being its major preoccupation. All those dumpy female cousins literally slather at the idea of being able to report my indiscretions back to old J.D. himself.”

  Raphael began to unpack.

  “J.D.’s the family patriarch,” Flood went on. “The whole damned bunch genuflects in his direction five times a day—except me, of course. I suppose I’ve never really forgiven him for tacking that ‘Junior’ on me, so I set out to be as unlike him as I could. He looks on that as a personal insult, so we don’t really get along. He started shipping me off to boarding schools as soon as I lost my baby teeth, though, so we only irritate each other on holidays. I tried a couple years at Pitt, but all that rah-rah bullshit got on my nerves. So I thought I’d saddle up old Paint and strike out for the wide wide west—What do you say to another drink?” He sprang up immediately and began mixing another batch of martinis.

  Their conversation became general after that, and they both grew slightly drunk before they went to bed.

  After Flood had turned out the light, he continued to talk, a steady flow of random, drowsy commentary on the day’s events. In time the pauses between his observations became longer as he hovered on the verge of sleep. Finally he turned over in bed. “Good night, Gabriel,” he murmured.

  “Wrong archangel,” Raphael corrected. “Gabriel’s the other one—the trumpet player.”

  “Did I call you Gabriel?” Flood’s voice had a strange, alert tension in it. “Stupid mistake. I must have had one martini too many.”

  “It’s no big thing. Good night, Damon.” Once again, however, something in the very back of his mind seemed to be trying to warn Raphael. Flood’s inadvertent use of the name Gabriel seemed not to be just a slip of the tongue. There was a significance to it somehow—obscure, but important.

  In the darkness, waiting for sleep and listening to Flood’s regular breathing from the other bed, Raphael considered his roommate. He had never before met anyone with that moneyed, eastern prep-school background, and so he had no real basis for judgment. The young men he had met before had all come from backgrounds similar to his own, and the open, easy camaraderie of the playing field and the locker room had not prepared him for the complexity of someone like Flood. On the whole, though, he found his roommate intriguing, and the surface sophistication of their first evening exhilirating. Perhaps in time Flood would relax, and they’d really get to know each other, but it was still much too early to know for sure.

  iii

  Raphael’s next few weeks were a revelation to him. Always before he had been at best a casual scholar. His mind was quick and retentive, and neither high school nor the community college he had attended had challenged him significantly. He had come to believe that, even as on the football field, what others found difficult would be easy for him. His p
erformance in the classroom, like his performance on the field, had been more a reflection of natural talent than of hard work; everything had been very easy for Raphael. At Reed, however, it was not so. He quickly discovered that a cursory glance at assigned reading did not prepare him adequately for the often brutally cerebral exchanges of the classroom. Unlike his previous classmates, these students were not content merely to paraphrase the text or the remarks of the instructor, but rather applied to the material at hand techniques of reason and analysis Raphael had never encountered before. Amazingly, more often than not, the results of these reasonings were a direct challenge to the authority of the text or of the instructor. And, even more amazingly, these challenges were not viewed as the disruptions of troublemakers, but were actually encouraged. Disturbed and even embarrassed by his newfound inadequacy, Raphael began to apply himself to his studies.

  “You’re turning into a grind,” Flood said one evening. Raphael pulled his eyes from the page he was reading. “Hmmm?”

  “You study too much. I never see you without your face in some damned book.”

  “That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”

  “Not hardly.” Flood threw one leg over the arm of his chair. “A gentleman does not get straight A’s. It’s unseemly. Haven’t you ever heard the old formula? ‘Three C’s and a D and keep your name out of the newspapers’?”

  “No. I hadn’t heard that one.” Raphael’s mind was yearning back toward the book. “Besides, how would you know here? They won’t let us see our grades.” That was one of the peculiarities of what was called the “Reed experience.”

  “Barbarous,” Flood snorted. “How the hell can we be expected to maintain a proper balance if they don’t let us see our grades? Do you realize that a man could screw up? Stumble into so many high grades that his reputation’s ruined for life?”

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about that, Damon. I don’t think you’re in any danger.”

  “Don’t get shitty.” Flood got up quickly. “Let’s go out and get drunk—see if we can get arrested or something.”

  “I’ve got an early class tomorrow.” Raphael turned back to his book.

  “Talk to me, goddammit!” Flood said irritably, snatching the book from Raphael’s hands. “What the hell are you reading, anyway?”

  “Kierkegaard.” Raphael reached for his book.

  “The Sickness unto Death,” Flood read. “Now there’s a cheery little tide. What class is this for?”

  Raphael shrugged. “It came up in a discussion. I thought I ought to look into it.”

  “You mean it’s not even required?” Flood demanded incredulously, tossing the book back. “That’s disgusting, Raphael, disgusting.”

  “Different strokes,” Raphael said, finding his place again and settling back to his reading. Flood sat watching him, his black eyes as hard as agates.

  And then there was the problem of the girl. She sat across the room from him in one of his afternoon classes, and Raphael found his eyes frequently drawn to her face. It was not that she was exceptionally beautiful, for she was not. Her face was slightly angular with strong bones, and she was quite tall with a coltish legginess that made her seem somehow very young. Her voice, however, was a deep, rich contralto with a vibrance, a quality, that stirred Raphael immeasurably each time she spoke. But she spoke infrequently. Sometimes a week would pass without a word from her. While others in the class talked endlessly, arguing, discussing, pushing themselves forward, she would sit quietly, taking occasional notes and now and then stirring restlessly as Raphael’s gaze became warmly obvious.

  He began to try to challenge her—to force her to speak. He frequently said things he did not actually believe, hoping to lever her into discussion. He did not even care what she said, but merely yearned for the sound of that voice, that rich, vibrant sound that seemed somehow to plunge directly into the center of his being. She began, in time, to return his glances, but she still seldom spoke, and the infrequency of her speech left him frustrated—even angry with himself for his absurd fascination. Her name, he discovered, was Marilyn Hamilton, and she lived off campus. Beyond that, he was able to find out very little about her.

  “You’re Taylor, aren’t you?” a large, bulky man with a huge black beard asked him one afternoon as he came out of the library.

  “Right,” Raphael replied.

  “Name’s Wallace Pierson.” The big man held out his hand. “I understand you’ve played a little football.”

  “Some.” Raphael shifted his books so that he could shake the man’s hand.

  “We’re—uh—trying to put together a team,” Pierson said, seeming almost apologetic. “Nothing very formal. Wondered if you might be interested.”

  “Intramural?”

  “No, not exactly.” Pierson laughed. “It’s just for the hell of it, really. You see, there’s a Quaker college across town—George Fox. They have a sort of a team—pretty low-key. They sent us an invitation. We thought it might be sort of interesting.” He fell in beside Raphael and they walked across the broad lawn toward the dormitories.

  “I haven’t got the kind of time it takes for practice,” Raphael told him.

  “Who has? We’re not really planning to make a big thing out of it-—just a few afternoons so that we can get familiar with each other—not embarrass ourselves too badly.”

  “That’s not the way to win football games.”

  “Win?” Pierson seemed startled. “Hell, Taylor, we weren’t planning to win—just play. Good God, man, you could get expelled for winning—overemphasis and all that jazz. We just thought it might be kind of interesting to play, that’s all.”

  Raphael laughed. “That’s the Reed spirit.”

  “Sure.” Pierson grinned. “If we can hold them to ten touchdowns, it’ll be a moral victory, won’t it?”

  “I’ll think it over.”

  “We’d appreciate it. We’re a little thin in the backfield. We thought we’d get together about four or so this afternoon—see if there are enough of us to make a team. Drop on down if you’d like.”

  “When’s the game?”

  “Friday.”

  “Three days? You plan to put a team together in three days?” Pierson shrugged. “We’re not really very serious about it.” “I can see that. I’ll think it over.”

  “Okay,” the bearded man said. “Maybe we’ll see you at four then.”

  “Maybe.”

  But of course he did play. The memory of so many afternoons was still strong, and he had, he finally admitted, missed the excitement, the challenge, the chance to hurl himself wholly into violent physical activity.

  Pierson, despite his bulk, played quarterback, and the great black beard protruding from the face mask of his helmet made the whole affair seem ludicrous. On the day of the game their plays were at best rudimentary, and they lost ground quite steadily. The small cluster of students who had gathered to watch the game cheered ironically each time they were thrown for a loss.

  “Hand it off to me,” Raphael suggested to Pierson in the huddle on their third series of plays when they were trailing 13-0. “If you try that keeper play one more time, that left tackle of theirs is going to scramble your brains for you.”

  “Gladly,” Pierson agreed, puffing.

  “Which way are you going?” one of the linemen asked Raphael.

  “I haven’t decided yet,” Raphael said, and broke out of the huddle.

  After the snap Pierson handed him the ball, and Raphael angled at the opposing line. He sidestepped a clumsy tackle, found a hole, and broke through. The afternoon sun was very bright, and his cleats dug satisfyingly into the turf. He reversed direction, outran two tacklers, and scored quite easily.

  A thin cheer went up from the spectators.

  In time his excellence even became embarrassing. He began to permit himself to be tackled simply to prevent the score from getting completely one-sided. More and more of the students drifted down to watch.

  On the la
st play of the game, knowing that it was the last play and knowing that he would probably never play again, Raphael hurled himself up and intercepted an opponent’s pass deep in his own end zone. Then, simply for the joy of it, he ran directly into the clot of players massed at the goal line. Dodging, feinting, sidestepping with perfect coordination, he ran through the other team. Once past the line, he deliberately ran at each member of the backfield, giving all in turn a clear shot at him and evading them at the last instant.

  The wind burned in his throat, and he felt the soaring exhilaration that came from the perfect functioning of his body. Then, after running the full length of the field and having offered himself to every member of the opposing team, he ran into the end zone, leaped high into the air, and slammed the ball down on the turf so violently that it bounced twenty feet straight up. When he came down, he fell onto his back, laughing for sheer joy.

  iv

  On the Saturday morning after the football game Raphael was stiff and sore. His body was out of condition, and his muscles reacted to the exertion and bruising contact of the game. He still felt good, though.

  Flood was up early, which was unusual, since he normally slept late on weekends. “Come along, football hero,” he said to Raphael, “rise and shine.” His eyes glittered brightly.

  Raphael groaned and rolled over in bed.

  “Quickly, quickly,” Flood commanded, snapping his fingers.

  “What’s got you all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed this morning?” Raphael demanded sourly.

  “Today we go a-visiting,” Flood said exuberantly. “Today I carry the conquering hero to visit the queen.”

  “Some other time.” Raphael laid one arm across his eyes. “I’m in no condition for queens today.”

  “I wouldn’t touch that line with a ten-foot pole—or a nine-foot Hungarian either. You might as well get up. I’m not going to let you sleep away your day of triumph.”